


A Rose By Any Other Name

by rhysiana



Series: Petals and Thorns [3]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: (sort of), Accidental Child Acquisition, Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Florist!Nursey, Homophobia, M/M, Musician!Dex, Nonbinary Character, Some Not-So-Usual Days in the Life: A Future Ficlet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-05
Updated: 2018-06-05
Packaged: 2019-05-18 17:08:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14856771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rhysiana/pseuds/rhysiana
Summary: Will and Derek didn't intend for their boring, quiet vacation in Maine to end with the invention of a scholarship and the semi-adoption of a teenage art prodigy, but sometimes these things happen. (ft. Shitty & Lardo as guest avenging angels)





	A Rose By Any Other Name

**Author's Note:**

> Because @soholsom asked for "a little glimpse of The Punk and the Florist a few years later. Like a day in the life or whatever," and I'd had it rolling around in the back of my mind for far too long. This isn't quite as full a fic as the other two, but as a kind of future fic epilogue, I think I'm happy with it.
> 
> (This will probably make very little sense if you haven't read the first two fics in the series, just FYI.)

Will brought a cup of coffee out to his mother on the back deck and stood next to her inhaling the rising steam, watching the boats go out while he waited for his to be cool enough to drink.

“And here I thought Derek was always complaining you’re not a morning person,” she said as she took a sip.

He shrugged. “Never can seem to sleep in here. Old habits.”

She hummed in noncommittal agreement. He wasn’t sure if that was meant to be a comment on how often he managed to make it home, or maybe just her memory of prying him out of bed in his adolescence. He decided not to ask.

“You talked to your cousin Kathleen recently?”

He shook his head and took a sip of his own coffee, finally cool enough. The only inconvenience of drinking it black he’d ever found. “I guess I saw her at Christmas at Gram’s. She still married to that jackass husband?”

“Mm-hmm.” His mom took another slow sip of coffee.

This conversation was starting to seem very pointed, but she clearly wasn’t going to just come out with it. He knew it was hard for her to speak ill of family. “How she’s managing to raise their kids so right despite him, I don’t know.”

She turned to take her mug back inside and he knew he’d hit the right spot. “Think you should go see ’em today. The kids would love to see you. That Cam, you know. So creative.”

Ah. He got it now. He knocked back the rest of his coffee. “Yeah, all right.”

***

He found Derek weeding the flower bed he’d put in Will’s parents’ side yard, chiefly to give him something to do whenever they were visiting, though his mother had been enthusiastically in favor. There were a lot of lively email exchanges about new bulbs every year. Will maintained his neutrality carefully.

“Hey,” he said, taking the opportunity to watch Derek’s shoulders move under his lightly sweaty t-shirt, as if he didn’t get to do this all the time now. It never got old.

Derek sat back on his heels and wiped his forehead with the back of his gloved hand. “What’s up?”

“Mom very pointedly suggested we go visit one of my cousins. Well, me, but I think this is probably a ‘we’ situation.”

Derek stood up and tugged off his gloves. “Sure. Let me go clean up and then we can, I dunno, take them to lunch or something.”

“Thank you,” Will said. He had a bad feeling about this.

Derek leaned in to brush a quick kiss across his lips. “Of course. You know I’ve got you, whatever you need.”

Will didn’t think he’d ever get tired of the warm feeling that spread through his chest whenever he thought about that. “I know.”

***

Kathleen opened the door looking frazzled. “Will! I don’t… your mother didn’t tell me you’d be stopping by.” She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear nervously.

He glanced over her shoulder and saw her mother-in-law glaring at him from the kitchen. “I just thought I’d offer to take Cam and Jessie out to lunch. I didn’t get to spend much time with them back at Christmas.”

“Oh, that’s nice of you. Um, do you and Derek want to come in while I go find them? They should be up by now…” She trailed off uncertainly.

Derek put a hand on the small of Will’s back and nudged him through the doorway. “Thank you, Kathleen, that would be great,” he said with what Will recognized as his customer service smile.

The air of tension was so pervasive once they stepped inside that neither of them felt inclined to sit on the couch or otherwise make themselves comfortable. A pan banged in the kitchen, and Derek reached out to ostentatiously lace their fingers together. Will squeezed them in response and pulled him over to pretend to look at the collection of family photos hanging on the living room wall.

Derek nudged him in the ribs with an elbow, subtle but urgent. Will looked over and Derek widened his eyes, then glanced pointedly at the coffee table, covered in magazines and brochures. Including one for a conversion camp.

Hot anger crashed over Will like a wave, fury sending his blood ice cold even though he could tell his face was flaming. It had been a long, long time since he felt this way. He snapped his eyes to the opposite wall and focused resolutely on nothing as he clenched his jaw against his initial reaction. The only thing that would accomplish would be getting them permanently thrown out of the house, and also prevent Will from being able to _do_ anything.

“Here they are!” Kathleen said, shepherding two teenagers into the room in front of her. Will’s eyebrows rose at how… wholesome they both looked, like they’d stepped directly off a Land’s End catalog page even though it was the weekend.

Derek stepped forward to take charge of the conversation, clearly able to tell that letting Will speak to any adult in this house right now would be a bad idea. “Hey, Cam! Hey, Jessie! We thought we’d take you out to lunch and stuff this afternoon. Maybe you can show me some more of the town? All of your uncle’s info is out of date.”

Jessie giggled and Cam ventured half a smile. Will felt a little of the tension seep out of his shoulders.

He held the door open for the others. “Shall we?”

***

They took the kids to the local diner, where Derek insisted on reveling in their intentional retro-ness fully by ordering malted milkshakes. Will tried to channel the coldness of his glass through his fingers into his temper, but it was probably listening to Derek’s determined cheerful inanity that helped more than anything. (A skill, Will knew, that Derek had perfected through years of attending dinner parties and charity events with his parents, and only fell back on in times of stress, which did not make Will feel great, grateful as he was for it right now.)

Gradually the kids relaxed as well, losing some of the strained look they’d been wearing around their eyes, and Will asked them questions about what they’d been doing in school.

“I really like my art classes,” Cam said, eyes firmly on the placemat in front of him, Poindexter complexion flushing in embarrassment right on cue.

“That’s great,” Will said, going for something encouraging without sounding so enthusiastic it would come off as insincere. “What kinds of things do you like best so far?”

Cam risked a look at him out of the corner of his eye and straightened up a little more. “I thought printmaking was really cool, but it’s really hard to think in just positive and negative space, you know? And then you have to think it in reverse, kind of, when you’re carving out the design.” He got more animated as he went on, and Will almost wanted to cry in relief that whatever was going on at home hadn’t been allowed to go on for long enough to crush all the kid’s joy. He wanted to believe his mother would have found a way to intervene before it came to that, but he knew the whole family had been trying to insulate Kathleen from her husband’s family and their influence for years, to only minimal success.

“Hey,” he suggested as he signed the receipt for their meal, “do you guys wanna go over to the shed?”

Jessie’s eyes widened. “Do you mean it?”

“Sure,” he said, trying not to laugh. Being famous and from a small town meant the weirdest things became enshrined. He had no idea what would happen if either James’ or Mike’s respective parents decided to move and the boat shed between their houses had to have ownership officially declared. It hadn’t really been intended as a permanent structure, and certainly no one had ever anticipated it becoming the birthplace of a successful punk band, but here they were. Will had considered offering to truck it somewhere else in town so the Wisniewskis wouldn’t have to deal with people sneaking through their yards to try to break into it anymore, but he doubted it would survive the trip.

They walked over, nothing about the distances in the main part of town having changed in all the years since Will had lived here, and he waved to James’ mom, out in her yard, as he led them all down the gravel drive between the houses, fishing his keys out of his pocket by their chain as he went. He paused to bang on the rear storm door of Mike’s house before walking the last few yards and undoing the padlock. Nostalgia flooded over him as he tugged open the doors and waved the kids in to admire all the now extremely dated band posters stuck to the walls.

Mike wandered out to join them. “’Sup, man?”

“You wanna teach Jessie how to drum?”

Mike, easily their most easygoing band member, just blinked at him and tilted his head slightly.

“I need to talk to Cam.”

“Ah, gotcha.” The family grapevines were clearly still very active. He obediently headed off to lure Jessie into doing something loud and distracting.

Will headed over to the scratchy plaid yard sale couch in the corner and reached for a guitar out of pure habit. He came up with an electric he didn’t bother to plug into an amp and started fingering chords with no sound to give his hands something to do. Just as he’d hoped, Cam drifted over to sit next to him soon. Derek sat nearby in the broken recliner and pulled out the Moleskine that lived in his back pocket, pretending to become absorbed in writing notes to himself.

“Do you really leave instruments out here all the time?” Cam asked curiously. “I thought that was bad for them.”

“Nah,” Will said. “But if he’s gonna be here very long, Mike always brings a drum set, and his parents still say he can’t do it in the house, so he sets it up out here. And then James and I inevitably end up dumping our guitars here, too. We did put in some insulation when we first got money, you know. To help control for too much temperature fluctuation. It’s fine if we’re not here for very long.”

“Oh.” Cam was quiet for a few minutes. “When do you have to go back?”

Will hummed noncommittally. “Well, we only really planned to stay for two weeks, but, you know, things are flexible.”

Cam fidgeted next to him, clearly working up to saying something.

“Why?” Will prompted.

Cam took a deep breath. “They’re not as bad when you’re in town,” he said quietly.

Will didn’t bother to ask who. “The brochure I saw?”

Cam nodded. “They were talking about it before you came. But they won’t do anything while you’re here. You and Derek.”

How the hell Manic Generation’s fame had somehow transformed Will and the weird Wisniewski cousins into local authority figures he’d never understand, but in this particular case he was willing to go with it.

“I’m not even gay,” Cam whispered.

Will frowned in confusion. He certainly didn’t think Cam was under the impression he wouldn’t approve; Will and Derek's wedding had been here and _all_ of the family had been there. There had been three cakes. The kids’ generation had been thrilled. He'd heard about it for the whole next year.

Derek put down his notebook. Will set the guitar carefully aside.

“Yeah, buddy?”

“I don’t even think I’m a boy.”

Will put an arm around the kid’s shoulders and tugged them into his side. “Oh, kid. It’s okay.” Cam was crying silently into Will’s shirt now, and he brought a hand up to smooth their hair down. He met Derek’s eyes over Cam’s head and nodded. “It’s gonna be all right.”

***

Will slammed into the art room of his old high school feeling distinctly out of place but too angry to care. “I need you to invent an art prize.”

Ms. Stewart didn’t even look surprised, like she had furious rock stars bursting into her classroom at 7am every Monday. “This is about Cam.”

“Damn straight.”

“Good. I’ve been pulling a portfolio together for them all year. I assume you’ll be funding some sort of scholarship?”

“Sure, call it whatever you want.”

Derek ducked into the room behind him with far less drama, phone in hand. “My mom’s on the board of the arts academy in Manhattan. She says she’s pretty sure she can make a last-minute transfer happen. She knows how to get stuff done with all kinds of official-looking fanfare. We can get the Knights to put their name on the scholarship, too, if you think that’ll make it look more legit. I already got all the transcript forms from the office here,” he added, waving a folder.

Will sat down abruptly on the table behind him. “Holy shit. How did you do that so fast? How did you even know…” He waved a hand to indicate the _everything_ that Derek had apparently just done. Will was used to being the one with a plan, but he’d come storming in here with only the vaguest outline of one, having lain awake all night trying to think of what to do.

Derek’s face took on a look of quietly furious seriousness Will had never seen. “I may not like using my family’s connections for myself or even having much to do with that world at all anymore, but I will be _damned_ if I don’t pull every string I know for this. We’re making this happen, and we’re doing it _now_. I don’t care if we have to just straight-up lie and then hire a private tutor to homeschool Cam for the rest of the year, we’re not leaving here without them.” His phone rang, and he turned to go back into the hall to answer it. “Make it happen,” he said on his way out.

Ms. Stewart blinked at the door and then at Will. “Well,” she said.

“Yeah,” Will answered.

“Guess we better do what he says.”

They got to work.

***

Will sat at one end of the high school administration office’s conference table and watched the tiny Asian woman with the intimidatingly chic hair and viciously winged eyeliner awe the shit out of Kathleen and her husband.

“Cam’s portfolio is one of the best our scholarship committee has ever seen. The breadth of media explored is impressive, and already displays such promise.” She went through the portfolio piece by piece, art jargon flowing from her lips like honey, Ms. Stewart next to her nodding seriously all the while.

“ _Such_ an honor to have one of our students chosen,” she said, like this was an art prize that had existed before two days ago. Will wondered if she taught drama as well.

“But… New York,” Kathleen said hesitantly.

Will’s mother, who had abused her friendship with the principal’s secretary shamelessly to get this meeting arranged to her satisfaction, leaned forward. “That’s why Will’s here, dear. He says Cam can live with him.”

“We have plenty of room,” Will said, trying his best to smile without too many teeth in it. “It would be our pleasure.”

Cam’s father scowled, but shrank under the determinedly cheerful pride of everyone else in the room and said nothing.

“Let me walk you through the paperwork,” the guy with the mustache who had come with the tiny Asian woman said.

Really, the opposition stood no chance.

***

“Brah,” Mustache Guy said, pulling off his tie as soon as he walked through the Poindexters’ front door, “that was motherfucking _exhilarating_!”

He grabbed Derek and pulled him into a back-slapping hug.

“Hey, Shitty,” Derek said into the guy’s hair.

“Bro, language,” the tiny Asian woman said, and then kicked off her heels with obvious relief. She turned to Will. “Sorry, I don’t think we really got properly introduced. Larissa. Went to college with Nursey.”

“What up, Lards? I’m Nursey again, but now you’re Larissa?” Derek said. He looked at the guy he’d called Shitty. “Are we using real names now?”

“No, we abso-fucking-lutely are not,” the guy said emphatically before turning to offer his hand to Will. “I’m Shitty. Knight. I don’t answer to the thing my parents saddled me with.”

“Cool,” Will said faintly, and then his brain made a connection. “Oh, you’re the one who went to Andover with Derek, too.”

“Guilty.”

“We were so sorry we couldn’t make it to your wedding,” Larissa added. “I was curating this major traveling show, and we thought at least Shitty would be able to make it, but he had a case blow up in his face—it was all just a mess.”

“It’s no big,” Derek said. “I know you were there in spirit.”

Shitty took him by the shoulders and looked at him very seriously, all joking façade dropping away. “No, it was mad important, my dude. And it broke my heart not to be there.”

Derek actually looked mildly embarrassed by this display of sincerity, and Will could suddenly see why these people were so important to him. He resolved to find ways to get them to New York more often.

“Now, we can’t stay long,” Shitty said, energy ramping back up, “but you can definitely show us around.”

“Thanks for coming up on such short notice,” Derek said.

Larissa just rolled her eyes at him. “As if I could prevent him from getting involved in a fight like this. You’re just lucky I got him to bring real clothes. He was all set to jump in the car in his boxers.”

Shitty tugged her into his side and planted a dramatic kiss on top of her head. “Please, you were the star of today. They never would have been convinced without you, you art world _goddess_.”

Larissa’s cheeks pinked ever so slightly and she pushed him off. She turned to Will instead. “You got somewhere I can change? I can’t do this suit shit all day.”

Will smiled as he led her down the hall to the guest room he and Derek were using, finally starting to believe it had all worked out.

***

A series of framed photos hung along the stairs to the third floor of Derek’s brownstone:

[A photo of Cam, unaware, reading a book behind the cash register in the shop, surrounded by plants in late afternoon sunlight.]

[A photo of Cam and friends backstage at a Manic Generation concert, grinning widely, wearing black nail polish and glitter eye shadow.]

[A photo of Cam and Larissa in front of a large canvas in an art gallery, Larissa gesturing to make a point and Cam looking deeply attentive.]

[Will, Derek, Shitty, and Larissa sitting around the table on the roof, laughing. Shitty is wearing a flower crown.]

[The full-sized Manic Generation album cover Cam designed for their live compilation album.]

**Author's Note:**

> Behold, my [Tumblr](https://rhysiana.tumblr.com/).


End file.
